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HIAS and other groups ask Biden administration to extend protected status to Israelis in US

WASHINGTON (JTA) — HIAS, the Jewish immigration advocacy group, and seven other Jewish groups asked the Biden Administration to extend protected status to Israelis in the United States who fear returning to a warzone.

The letter sent Friday asks President Joe Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to extend to Israelis deciding to wait out the war in the United States Temporary Protected Status or Deferred Enforced Departure. The statuses allow people holding them to work legally.

It notes reports that Palestinian non-citizens in the United States are under consideration to be eligible for those statuses because of the Israel-Hamas war launched by the terrorist group on Oct. 7.

“We recognize that TPS will provide protections to Palestinians in the U.S., ensuring that they do not have to return home to the midst of ongoing conflict,” said the letter, which HIAS released to the media on Monday. “Granting TPS to Palestinians is an essential step, but it should also be accompanied by a similar announcement for Israelis.”

The other seven signatories are J Street, the liberal Jewish Middle East policy group; the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a national public policy group; the Jewish Labor Committee; Jewish Women International; National Council of Jewish Women; the Rabbinical Assembly, the rabbinical arm of the Conservative movement; and T’ruah, a rabbinic human rights group.

In an interview, HIAS President Mark Hetfield said the statement came about because of queries from Jewish Family Services offices from around the country that are assisting Israelis who have come here temporarily during the war. Many Jewish day schools have accepted children who are in the country for an unknown amount of time.

“Israel is under fire every day, they have incoming missiles. There’s no flights to Israel, or very few flights,” he said, also noting that the State Department has put out travel warnings to Israel and the West Bank. “We have a lot of Israelis who want to delay their return home right now and are talking to Jewish Family Service agencies and whatnot around the country. So we think it’s only fair that they’d be included in the designation.”


The post HIAS and other groups ask Biden administration to extend protected status to Israelis in US appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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Kurdish-led SDF Say Five Members Killed During Attack by Islamic State in Syria

Islamic State slogans painted along the walls of the tunnel was used by Islamic State militants as an underground training camp in the hillside overlooking Mosul, Iraq, March 4, 2017. Photo: via Reuters Connect.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said on Sunday that five of its members had been killed during an attack by Islamic State militants on a checkpoint in eastern Syria’s Deir el-Zor on July 31.

The SDF was the main fighting force allied to the United States in Syria during fighting that defeated Islamic State in 2019 after the group declared a caliphate across swathes of Syria and Iraq.

The Islamic State has been trying to stage a comeback in the Middle East, the West and Asia. Deir el-Zor city was captured by Islamic State in 2014, but the Syrian army retook it in 2017.

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Armed Groups Attack Security Force Personnel in Syria’s Sweida, Killing One, State TV Reports

People ride a motorcycle past a burned-out military vehicle, following deadly clashes between Druze fighters, Sunni Bedouin tribes, and government forces, in Syria’s predominantly Druze city of Sweida, Syria, July 25, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi

Armed groups attacked personnel from Syria’s internal security forces in Sweida, killing one member and wounding others, and fired shells at several villages in the violence-hit southern province, state-run Ekhbariya TV reported on Sunday.

The report cited a security source as saying the armed groups had violated the ceasefire agreed in the predominantly Druze region, where factional bloodshed killed hundreds of people last month.

Violence in Sweida erupted on July 13 between tribal fighters and Druze factions. Government forces were sent to quell the fighting, but the bloodshed worsened, and Israel carried out strikes on Syrian troops in the name of the Druze.

The Druze are a minority offshoot of Islam with followers in Syria, Lebanon and Israel. Sweida province is predominantly Druze but is also home to Sunni tribes, and the communities have had long-standing tensions over land and other resources.

A US-brokered truce ended the fighting, which had raged in Sweida city and surrounding towns for nearly a week. Syria said it would investigate the clashes, setting up a committee to investigate the attacks.

The Sweida bloodshed last month was a major test for interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, after a wave of sectarian violence in March that killed hundreds of Alawite citizens in the coastal region.

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Netanyahu Urges Red Cross to Aid Gaza Hostages

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference, in Jerusalem, May 21, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun/Pool

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he spoke with the International Red Cross’s regional head, Julien Lerisson, and requested his involvement in providing food and medical care to hostages held in Gaza.

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